Hydrocarbon oil-contaminated soil assessment using electrical resistivity topography

Abstract

In Kuwait, oil wells exploded in 1991 have created numerous massive oil lakes, which have subsequently dried and contaminated the soil. A research project was initiated to delineate the type and extent of contaminated soil using an area survey method, namely Electrical Resistivity Topography (ERT), to examine dry oil lakes located in Bahra, Subiya. The specific objective was to assess the applicability of the environmentally friendly ERT to assist in the design of measures to remediate the contaminated land. ERT results were generated by testing a grid in both contaminated and non-contaminated areas. In addition, conventional soil boreholes were used to explore the sub-surface profile and depth of contamination in these areas for comparison with ERT results. In-situ and laboratory physical and chemical tests were performed on soil samples collected from the site to identify the contamination type and concentration as well as variation in the physical properties of the soil profile with depth. Results indicated the contamination depth to be 1.2 m from the ground surface. These results were also confirmed by borehole analyses (chemical and physical). Chemical tests indicated that the contamination consists of hydrocarbons. The findings demonstrate that ERT can be used to establish a baseline in the assessment of potential hydrocarbon-contaminated sites and is applicable for determining the type and depth of contamination without the need for expensive and tedious boreholes and in-situ and laboratory soil testing.

Importance of soil physical characteristics for petroleum hydrocarbons phytoremediation: A review

“…After delineating and expressing the type and extent of contaminated soil and also finding out the methods to quantify the petroleum substances (Gan et al, 2009;Liu et al, 2011;Zhang et al, 2012;Abdullah et al, 2014;Pinedo et al, 2014;Potashev et al, 2014;Zhang et al, 2014;Wolejko et al, 2016), the subjected soil should be characterized as the first step in planning remediation strategies (Mao et al, 2009). This step includes testing and analyzing soil physical, chemical and biological characteristics.…”

Assessment of the suitability of Kuwait oil sands for beneficial reuse

“…This resulted in the formation of approximately 300 large oil spill lakes, which covered 0.65% of the entire surface area of the country and remained to this day. These oil lakes vary in their type of contaminants, surface area, penetration depth, and the level of contamination (Abdullah et al, 2014). According to Elgibaly (1999), the volume of Kuwaiti desert sand contaminated by oil is approximately 18 million cubic meters.…”